The London Marathon ballot

It’s ballot day today for a couple hundred thousand runners, that’s right, today is the day you can stick your name in the hat in the off chance that you might get a place in the 2017 London Marathon. In other words, that’s my annual London Marathon rejection apparel ordered, I look forward to receiving it in early October.

I’ve now entered the ballot 7 years in a row, in years gone by that would have automatically got me in, it used to be 5 rejections and you qualify for a place. In typical form they abolished that rule as I was just about to qualify for one.

I know I could quite easily get a place by running for a charity, but that in itself can be just as hard as the training. It costs the charities X amount per place, you then have to raise enough money to pay for the charity place and raise a bit of money for them too. This is normally in well in excess of £1000 of which the charity gets a paltry amount once the fee they get charged for your place is paid for. I don’t like this and I wish that there was more open disclosure around this as people are often completely unaware.

I’d rather stick my £39 in the pot, hope for a place and know that any fund raising I do ALL the money I raise goes to the charity of my choice, rather than into the coffers of this big money making machine.

We will see come early October if that is going to be the case or not.